RISING HOPE (in festival run)

Rising Hope is a documentary feature currently in post-production. It has been filmed in the Mississippi Delta, centered in the small town of Shaw, M.S. Since 2018, I have served as a producer on the project, which is directed by Theo Avgerinos.

For decades, the Mississippi Delta has been gutted of jobs and public school funding, but against the odds, ordinary people keep hope alive. One of those people is Dr. Jason Coker, a determined, Yale-educated preacher who returns home to confront the grinding cycle of poverty and racial injustice. Through the creation of Delta Hands for Hope, an afterschool program in his hometown of Shaw, MS, Jason and his team provide local youth a safe haven to be themselves, travel, and dream big. Born in this same small town a generation later than Jason, Roderious Phillips dreams of traveling the world as a professional photographer. But even with Jason's mentorship, it's a struggle to imagine a future outside of the Delta. Persevering through a historical onslaught of economic depression and political disenfranchisement, the good people of the Delta band together to turn the tables on the degrading narrative of rural poverty.

"Civil Hope" is a documentary series that takes a compassionate look at the faith that persists within darkness. It’s also a portrait of home: the place that makes us, the place we run from, and the place we return to.